Alright, so I’m a brown girl, atleast i thought I was? Both my parents are fully Pakistani, I speak the language, my skin is pretty brown and I have brown features, I always thought of myself as a brown person, so did my dads side of the family, but my mamu (my moms brother) never really took me as one. Whenever the topic came up, he always said (still does) i’m not a pakistani, since I was born here, haven’t been to pakistan and don’t have a “brown mindset” (whatever the heck that means), he doesn’t even speak the language with me, my maso (moms sister)’s bugged him about it, but he just refuses to see me as brown. I’ve always just ignored it, I mainly talk to my mom and maso (moms sister) and they always thought it was weird my mamu thought that. However, today I had some french homework, just some dumb little introduction in french, and I included the fact I’m brown. When I read it to my mom, she immediately said I’m not, i was confused, so I asked why, basically, we went back and forth about if I’m brown or not, and she ended up just leaving it. It bugged me, I don’t like how people don’t think i’m brown, if i’m not, what am i? If I’m not brown, and I know I’m not west asian, latina, white or black, what the heck am I? I’ve stopped speaking the language, but my mom hasn’t really noticed at all. Thing is, I talk to my maso every night, and her English isn’t the best so I usually talk to her in my- her language, so I think they’ll notice somethings up when I don’t speak it at all. I don’t want to have a confrontation infront of her, because I know they’ll ask, but I don’t want to just leave it. When I was younger, I never really understood I was brown, I always felt too different to fit in a “white” category, (my mom used to try to erase our brown descent, but thats a storytime for a different day) And I took pride in being a Pakistani, so it really bugged me. But, should I just let it go?
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Alright, so I’m a brown girl, atleast i thought I was? Both my parents are fully Pakistani, I speak the language, my skin is pretty brown and I have brown features, I always thought of myself as a brown person, so did my dads side of the family, but my mamu (my moms brother) never really took me as one. Whenever the topic came up, he always said (still does) i’m not a pakistani, since I was born here, haven’t been to pakistan and don’t have a “brown mindset” (whatever the heck that means), he doesn’t even speak the language with me, my maso (moms sister)’s bugged him about it, but he just refuses to see me as brown. I’ve always just ignored it, I mainly talk to my mom and maso (moms sister) and they always thought it was weird my mamu thought that. However, today I had some french homework, just some dumb little introduction in french, and I included the fact I’m brown. When I read it to my mom, she immediately said I’m not, i was confused, so I asked why, basically, we went back and forth about if I’m brown or not, and she ended up just leaving it. It bugged me, I don’t like how people don’t think i’m brown, if i’m not, what am i? If I’m not brown, and I know I’m not west asian, latina, white or black, what the heck am I? I’ve stopped speaking the language, but my mom hasn’t really noticed at all. Thing is, I talk to my maso every night, and her English isn’t the best so I usually talk to her in my- her language, so I think they’ll notice somethings up when I don’t speak it at all. I don’t want to have a confrontation infront of her, because I know they’ll ask, but I don’t want to just leave it. When I was younger, I never really understood I was brown, I always felt too different to fit in a “white” category, (my mom used to try to erase our brown descent, but thats a storytime for a different day) And I took pride in being a Pakistani, so it really bugged me. But, should I just let it go?
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> My family doesn’t believe i’m brown, so i’ve stopped speaking my language.
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Contest mode is 1.5 hours long on this post.
NTA but be who you want to be, who you feel you are. It’s nobody else’s business to tell you who you are. And please continue speaking Urdu at every opportunity! You’ll be sorry if you let it slide.
Also FYI this is kind of a classic thing with people whose families have moved at some point. They don’t fully identify with either the old country or the new. Nobody’s fault, it’s just a complicated deal.
ETA corrected name of language.
NTA
Not having been to Pakistan or stop speaking the language doesn’t make you any less Pakistani. I’m Mexican American and have never been to Mexico, and can barely speak Spanish. Doesn’t make me any less Mexican American.
NTA, but being multilingual is a great skill. No need to stop just because some people are ignorant. I was born in one country, spent my primary school years there, teenage and young adult in a different country, and university in a third country. I get where you’re coming from. And I still say, don’t leave a language because of others.
Please help me to understand your situation. First, pardon my ignorance but, in this case is there more to being “brown” than just skin color? Unless one of your parents is not really your parent, why would your mom be so adamant that you are not brown? Is the term shorthand for being Pakistani? Again, forgive my ignorance, I don’t want to offend.
I’m the same as you. Except the disagreement is a little different. My parents were both born in India, but post-partition went to PK. They eventually became Americans, but if you ask them where they are from, they say PK. I say my family came from India. Because geographically, my ancestors came from what is now India. They feel differently because they were expelled from India. I get that. They are entitled to their feelings about their own identity. I am entitled to mine. They always got mad and said I was Pakistani, but no, that has nothing to do with me. Who I actually am is American. But growing up in an entirely white place, I was told by the other kids that I wasn’t that. This is the point: You can decide who you are, no one else can. If your mamu doesn’t agree, who cares? He cannot tell you who you are. I cannot ask my parents to say they came from India, it’s not my place. They cannot tell me my people did not come from India. We are all speaking of our own understanding of ourselves. If he doesn’t understand you, that’s his problem, not yours. Keep speaking your language. Being bilingual makes it so much easier to be trilingual. And if you don’t speak, you do start to forget. That’s a bummer. Languages are superpowers. YWB TA only to yourself, though. Officially, NTA
NTA. While you are not legally Pakistani due to being born elsewhere, I have serious concerns with statements such as “brown mindset” and your mother’s insistence that you are not brown. From your description, I think this has more to do with what is most often termed an inferiority complex
NTA. You are brown, you are ethnically Pakistani, but the older people in your family see you as a second gen kid, which means you’re more assimilated to the culture of the country your parents migrated to away from Pakistan.
It’s an actual phenomenon studied in Sociology (second generation cultural displacement) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immigrant_generations that many people experience. It’s inherently discriminatory towards you, as the second gen, because you didn’t decide to migrate to your birth country, the generation before you did, however that choice they made means you are a successful citizen of that new country (that’s how socialization works, via kindergarten, schooling, social activities, extra curriculars, the new language you learn, the media you consume, etc). So there’s this very odd, very weird “grief” that first gen parents have about their kids.
And the stupidest thing is the reasons they migrated in the first place was TO GIVE THEIR KIDS A BETTER LIFE. But then turn around and begrudge the kids for that better life??!!?!?!
I totally understand how frustrating and confusing it is for you. When you finally have the conversation you can request that they stop calling you “not brown” and start calling you “second generation”, because that is the more accurate way of describing what they are trying to describe.
They cannot take away the fact that even in your birth country (not Pakistan) you are still perceived as a Brown person, with all of the baggage, racism, and microaggressions that come along with being seen as the “other”. They cannot invalidate that lived experience by saying you’re not brown, so you should wholeheartedly defend yourself against the notion, and coach your elders to use the proper terminology for the phenomenon they mean. If they refuse to change up then they are deliberately insulting you, and you can turn around and tell them “you are the ones that chose to come here and have me, you are the ones who created this situation for me, why do you punish me for the choices you made, why do you expect me to act like a first gen when it’s your fault that I’m a second gen in the first place?” Give them some of that nastiness back so it sinks in.
NTA. I will not offer much of an opinion or advice because that is not my culture, but I wish you best of luck… you should do what makes you feel good about yourself and proud of your heritage 🙂
I mean, I hate to say this, but have you seen Crazy Rich Asians? Where the daughter says she is “so Chinese [she] is an econ professor and lactose intolerant”? But when she meets her bf’s mom, she is treated like she isn’t Chinese at all?
Yes, you are a brown skinned person. You would never be included in the “white” community because you aren’t white. But compared to what someone who was born and raised in Pakistan would know as life, you are more American than Pakistani. That is what happens when families immigrate – cultural assimilation. Your Pakistani relatives in Pakistan won’t have the same life experiences as you, you won’t have the same life priorities as them. It doesn’t mean you can’t be a proud Pakistani woman.